Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Pirates Walk Off With Win

Jeff Suppan and Paul Maholm got together, and we hope none of the children were watching. By the end of the fifth, it was 7-7, and the starters, with an ineffective Seth McClung thrown in briefly, gave up fourteen earned runs on sixteen hits, with six going yard, and a half-dozen walks. Yikes!

The Pirates showed some long-missing muscle, launching four long balls off of Suppan and racing out to a quick 5-2 lead, only to see Maholm yield a pair of dingers with a couple of doubles thrown in for good measure. He hit the shower early, after 4-2/3 frames of work.

For the Bucs, Ryan Doumit banged out a pair that left the park, joined by Garrett Jones and Andrew McCutchen, with one more Brandon Moss bomb yet to come. Ryan Braun and Casey McGehee answered the call for Milwaukee.

But the bullpens settled the game down. Even Joel Hanrahan chipped in with 2-1/3 scoreless innings, much needed with Jeff Karstens still banged up from the latest beanball war between the clubs.

Moss led off the ninth with a walk-off shot into the bullpen, and the Bucs took what was no doubt a sweet win, 8-7, from their latest nemesis, the Brew Crew. It was nice to see them leave the field with both their shirts and tails tucked in.

Adam LaRoche, dealt to the Red Sox for a pair of middlin' prospects, stuck around for the whole game, and even joined in the victory celebration on the field. It was a classy exit for the quiet man.

We won't miss his streakiness at the dish, but LaRoche was a good guy with a great glove, and never had a bad word to say about his team, the management, the fans, or the City, as Dejan Kovacevic noted in his PBC blog for the Post Gazette.

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